Take Responsibility.

[trustbound]

This investigation seems to have been difficult for many; while your time here hasn't been particularly easy on anyone, it's been eight straight weeks of people dying, of losing those you care about - or at least, losing those you had some sense of solidarity with. There's only about a quarter of your original number left. Either way, however, there are some things that remain constant, even if your numbers do not - the corridor down below the dorms, the way the door sounds when it unlatches, the gentle outward swing of the door. The darkened stairwell that it leads to. The courtroom. The podium circle remains in the center of the room, the spots marked out from the dead having increased in number yet again; Aligula, Hibiki, Sayaka, and Alex all have had their podiums altered, draped in black with greyscale portraits set atop them. They'll be keeping an eye on the proceedings today, for better or for worse. As always, the thirty-sixth podium remains blank. Once everyone has found their place in the circle, Jericho can be heard over the public-address system; he doesn't seem to have settled any from the investigation. "Attentive and Submerged are gone - and trust me, for at least one of them, it's better for everyone that way. Maybe you disagree with that, maybe you don't, I don't really give a fuck - and at least for the guilty party, their deaths might be their ticket out of here. So it's probably better for them, anyway. Either way, I'm pretty sure I don't need to tell you what you're here to do. Once again and as always, it's the innocent versus the guilty. Whichever side wins is mattering less and less every week, isn't it? Even so, you should still put some effort in, just to satisfy the dead - so you know what, do your best!" Nine Participants remain. However many leave here at the end of the day is up to you.

Comments

[notaccurate]

I suppose it isn't a bad idea, if someone is going for multiple murders. More victims means fewer people to get the vote right, and someone always checks the bodies.

[evilfrenzy]

[Someone does indeed always check the bodies. It could have been any one of them, had Alex not gone charging in...]

Right. And they set this up in a way that would not require them to cover up any potentially damning evidence, as the victims died right in front of us.

[notaccurate]

And they wouldn't even need to be in the room when it happened. I wouldn't be surprised if the flash bang was just to get people to find the paint trail because we were taking too long to find it in the first place.

[evilfrenzy]

I wouldn't either. That had to have been what it was for.

[notaccurate]

Then I suppose the question we should be asking is 'who had an alibi for last night', since this obviously took a lot of setup. If we can eliminate a few people from the suspect pool, that would go a long way.

[chessturner]

I'm rather sure that'd eliminate Marker-san. If I'm not mistaken, Sayaka-chan and Marker-san often stay the night together, I wouldn't be surprised if they stayed together last night.

[heritrix]

Most damning evidence, anyways. We know now this is a very careful person, and someone with the technical know-how and the patience to set a trap like this up. Too patient, possibly, given they failed to lure anyone in during the night even with that paint trail. That might even be there downfall, if they happened to get any of it on them.

[hesperos]

So they might've gotten the paint on their shoes or clothes then, huh?

[evilfrenzy]

[Hmmm.]

Tarrlok did say it got smudged. But the paint was also rather fresh, from what I recall. They may have banked on the possibility that we would step in it on our way to the trap.

[heritrix]

Tarrlok did say the paint in the stairwell was smudged. In terms of finding physical evidence, it's probably our best lead from what's been presented.

[They were holding off on it before, wanting to discuss everything first, but she thinks they've heard everything now?]

[bloodisthicker]

Kyrie brought up the possibility that the killer could have clay on their clothes, too, so it's probably best to do an all-around clothing check to see if we can find either of those things.

[hesperos]

Alright, I'll go ahead and start doing that. Anyone who wants to help can feel free.

[ And off he goes! ]